Center for Science in the Public Interest

"CSPI" redirects here. For the Canadian school district, see Commission scolaire de la Pointe-de-l'Île.
Center for Science in the Public Interest
Abbreviation CSPI
Formation 1971
Type Non-profit
Purpose Consumer advocacy
Headquarters Washington, D.C.
Region served
 United States
Website cspinet.org

The Center for Science in the Public Interest (CSPI) is a Washington, D.C.-based non-profit watchdog and consumer advocacy group that advocates for safer and healthier foods.

History and funding

CSPI is a consumer advocacy organization. Its focus is nutrition and health, food safety, and alcohol policy. CSPI is headed by Michael F. Jacobson, who founded the group in 1971 along with James Sullivan and Albert Fritsch, two fellow scientists from Ralph Nader's Center for the Study of Responsive Law. In the early days, CSPI focused on various aspects such as nutrition, environmental issues, and nuclear energy. However, after the 1977 departure of Fritsch and Sullivan, CSPI began to focus exclusively on nutrition and food safety.[1]

CSPI has 501(c)(3) status. Its chief source of income is its Nutrition Action Health Letter, which has about 900,000 subscribers and does not accept corporate advertising.[2][3] The organization receives about 5 to 10 percent of its $17 million annual budget from grants by private foundations.

Programs and campaigns

Nutrition and food labeling

CSPI advocates for clearer nutrition and food labeling.[4] For example, labeling of "low-fat" or "heart healthy" foods in restaurants must now meet specific requirements established by the Food and Drug Administration as of May 2, 1997.[5] In 1994, the group first brought the issue of high saturated fat in movie popcorn to the public attention. In 2003, it worked with lawyer John F. Banzhaf III to pressure ice cream retailers to display nutritional information about their products.

In 1975, CSPI published a "White Paper on Infant Feeding Practices" aimed at criticizing the commercial baby food industry's products and advertising. The White Paper started a formalized, political discussion of issues surrounding early introduction of solid foods and the extraordinarily processed ingredients in commercial baby food. CSPI took particular issue with the modified starches, excessive sugar and salt additions, and presence of nitrates in baby food products. In addition, the White Paper criticized branding and advertisements on products, which they argued lead mothers to believe that solid foods ought to be introduced earlier in an infant's diet.[6]

In 1989, CSPI was instrumental in convincing fast-food restaurants to stop using animal fat for frying. They would later campaign against the use of trans fats.[7]

In 1998, the Center published a report entitled Liquid Candy: How Soft Drinks are Harming Americans' Health. It examined statistics relating to the soaring consumption of soft drinks, particularly by children, and the consequent health ramifications including tooth decay, nutritional depletion, obesity, type-2 (formerly known as "adult-onset") diabetes, and heart disease. It also reviewed soft drink marketing and made various recommendations aimed at reducing soft drink consumption, in schools and elsewhere. A second, updated edition of the report was published in 2005.[8] Among the actions they advocate taxing soft drinks.[9]

In January 2016, the Center released a report entitled Seeing Red - Time for Action on Food Dyes which criticized the continued use of artificial food coloring in the United States. The report estimated that over half a million children in the United States suffer adverse behavioral reactions as a result of ingesting food dyes, with an estimated cost exceeding $5 billion per year, citing data from by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The report urges the Food and Drug Administration to take action to ban or curtail the use of such dyes. [10]

School foods

CSPI has worked since the 1970s to improve the nutritional quality of school meals, and remove soda and unhealthy foods from school vending machines, snack bars, and a la carte lines. Despite pushback from the soda and snack food industries, CSPI successfully worked with a number of local school districts and states to pass policies in the early 2000s to restrict the sale of soda and other unhealthy snack foods in schools. In 2004, CSPI worked with members of the National Alliance for Nutrition and Activity (NANA) (a CSPI-led coalition) to include a provision in the Child Nutrition and WIC Reauthorization Act of 2004 to ensure all local school districts develop a nutrition and physical activity wellness policy by 2006.

In 2010, CSPI and NANA led the successful effort to pass the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act, a landmark law to improve child nutrition programs. The law (enacted 12/13/10) authorized the U.S. Department of Agriculture to update the nutrition standards for snacks and beverages sold in schools through vending machines, a la carte lines, school stores, fundraisers, and other school venues. CSPI worked with NANA to mobilize support for the updated nutrition standards and urge the USDA to adopt strong final school nutrition standards (released in June 2013). Despite opposition from some members of Congress and the potato and pizza industries (which lobbied for unlimited french fries and pizza as a vegetable in school meals) CSPI and NANA's efforts also resulted in strong nutrition standards for school lunches.

Menu labeling

One of CSPI's top goals has been to ensure that consumers have reliable information about what they eat and drink. Since the early 2000s, CSPI has worked with policymakers and advocates in Philadelphia, New York City, California, and numerous other jurisdictions to pass laws to list calories on menus and menu boards. In addition to making calorie information available to consumers, a key benefit of menu labeling has been the reformulation of existing food items and the introduction of nutritionally improved items in many chain restaurants.

In 2010, CSPI successfully lobbied for a provision, which was passed as part of the Affordable Care Act, to require calorie labeling on menus at chain restaurants and similar retail food establishments nationwide. The Food and Drug Administration proposed regulations for menu labeling in 2011, and CSPI has since worked to continue to mobilize support for national menu labeling, diffuse opposition from Congress and special interests, and encourage the FDA to strengthen the final regulations and release them in a timely manner. Menu labeling is expected to be implemented nationally in 2014.

Food Day: October 24

Food Day logo

In 2011, CSPI initiated a new project, Food Day, which is a nationwide celebration of healthy, affordable, and sustainably produced food and a grassroots campaign for better food policies. It builds all year long and culminates on October 24.[11]

Food Day aims to help people "Eat Real," which the project defines as cutting back on sugar drinks, overly salted packaged foods, and fatty, factory-farmed meats in favor of vegetables, fruits, whole grains, and sustainably raised protein. This annual event involves some of the country's most prominent food activists,[12] united by a vision of food that is healthy, affordable, and produced with care for the environment, farm animals, and the people who grow, harvest, and serve it.

Across the country, 3,200 events took place in 2012 and 2,300 in 2011, from community festivals in Denver, Savannah, and New York City, to a national conference in Washington, DC, to thousands of school activities in Portland, Minneapolis, and elsewhere.

Food Safety Initiative

One of CSPI's largest projects is its Food Safety Initiative, directed to reduce food contamination and foodborne illness. In addition to publishing Outbreak Alert!, a compilation of food-borne illnesses and outbreaks, the project supports the establishment of a new Food Safety Administration that would combine the food safety functions of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), and Department of Agriculture (USDA) into a single agency.

Healthier Food Choices for Public Places

A growing number of states and localities are working to improve the foods and beverages available in public places, such as parks, recreational facilities, community centers, highway rest stops, agencies buildings, childcare facilities, state hospitals, state universities, and correctional facilities. CSPI is working to support those efforts to offer healthier options through vending machines, cafeterias, concessions stands, institutional feeding, meetings, and events. So far the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act has required chain restaurants with 20 plus outlets to list the nutrition information including calories on all menus and menu boards. A high degree of public support for providing this nutrition and calorie information has been shown .

Funding History of the CDC's Division of Nutrition, Physical Activity, and Obesity

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention

CSPI has been working with other members of the National Alliance for Nutrition and Activity (NANA) to ensure that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) has adequate resources to address nutrition, physical activity, and obesity. In recent years, funding for CDC's obesity prevention programs has flat lined, despite obesity continuing to be a top public health threat in the country. In fiscal year 2013, Congress provided CDC with $41 million for the Division of Nutrition, Physical Activity, and Obesity (DNPAO); that is a mere 0.67% of total CDC funding and 4% of CDC's chronic disease budget.

Alcohol Policies Project

The group's "Alcohol Policies Project," now discontinued, advocated against what it considers adverse societal influences of alcohol, such as marketing campaigns that target young drinkers,[13] and promoted turning self-imposed advertising bans by alcohol industry groups into law.[14] The project was run by long-time director George Hacker, a lawyer who also co-directs the Coalition for the Prevention of Alcohol Problems.

One of the main activities of the project was the "Campaign for Alcohol-Free Sports TV". Launched in 2003 with support of at least 80 other local and national groups, the campaign asked schools to pledge to prohibit alcohol advertising on local sports programming and to work toward eliminating alcohol advertising from televised college sports programs.[15] It also sought Congressional support for such a prohibition.[16]

In addition, CSPI has pressured alcoholic beverage companies with lawsuits. In one such lawsuit, filed in September 2008, the Center "sue[d] MillerCoors Brewing Company over its malt beverage Sparks, arguing that the caffeine and guarana in the drink are additives that have not been approved by the FDA," and that the combination of those ingredients with alcohol resulted in "more drunk driving, more injuries, and more sexual assaults."[17]

1% or Less campaign

In the early 1990s, CSPI designed a social marketing campaign[18] to encourage adults and children (over age two) to switch from high-fat (whole and 2%) milk to low-fat (1% and fat-free) milk to reduce their intake of saturated fat and lower their risk of heart disease. The 1% or Less campaign used paid advertising, public relations, and community-based programs. The campaign was effective in communities nationwide, doubling low-fat milk sales data over the course of the eight-week pilot campaign.

Criticisms

CSPI's public policy recommendations, and sometimes the organization's motivation for making them, have been challenged by various parties, particularly those within the food industry that have been the most directly affected.

Of past advocacy

One example surrounds the organization's reversal of position on the question of trans fats during the 1980 and 1990s. During the 1980s, CSPI's campaign "Saturated Fat Attack" advocated the replacement of beef tallow, palm oil and coconut oil at fast food restaurants,[19] while maintaining that trans fats were comparatively benign.[20] In a 1986 pamphlet entitled "The Fast-Food Guide", it praised chains such as KFC that had converted to partially hydrogenated vegetable oils, which are lower in saturated fat but high in trans fat. As a result of this pressure, many restaurants such as McDonald's made the switch.[19][21] From the mid-1990s onward, however, CSPI identified trans fats as the greater public health danger.[22] CSPI executive director Michael Jacobson went on record saying, "Twenty years ago, scientists (including me) thought trans [fat] was innocuous. Since then, we've learned otherwise."[19]

In response, three trade groups – the National Restaurant Association, the National Association of Margarine Manufacturers and the Institute of Shortening and Edible Oils — "said the evidence [on trans fat] was contradictory and inconclusive, and accused [CSPI] of jumping to a premature conclusion."[23] Numerous studies and public health agencies have since supported the view that trans fats carry health risks.[24][25][26] A Wall Street Journal editorial acknowledged the risks, but argued, on the basis of its previous actions, that CSPI itself was to blame for creating the problem.[27]

Of policies

Other critics—such as the restaurant, food, and tobacco industry-funded Center for Consumer Freedom—refer to CSPI as "the Food Police,"[28][29] and suggest its focus on food manufacturers and retailers distracts from "real culprits ... a lack of exercise and people's unwillingness to take personal responsibility for their own diets."[28] Former U.S. Representative Bob Barr (a libertarian-leaning Republican) accused CSPI of pursuing "a pre-existing political agenda" and pointed to individual responsibility for dietary choices.[29] Cato Institute (a Washington D.C.-based libertarian think tank) scholar Walter Olson wrote that the group's "longtime shtick is to complain that businesses like McDonald's, rather than our own choices, are to blame for rising obesity," and called CSPI's suit against McDonald's on behalf of a California mother a "new low in responsible parenting".[30]

In 2002, food industry lobbyist Rick Berman, who is also the executive director of the Center for Consumer Freedom,[28] announced a series of print and radio ads designed in part to drive traffic to the CCF website. A San Francisco Chronicle article identified CSPI as "one of two groups singled out [by the CCF] for full-on attack," and said, "What's not mentioned on the [CCF] Web site is that it's one of a cluster of such nonprofits started... by Berman."[31][32]

References

  1. ↑ James Bennett & Thomas DiLorenzo, Food and Drink Police: Center for Science in the Public Interest wants government to control our eating habits, (Capital Research Center, 1998).
  2. ↑ "Nutrition Action Health Letter". Center for Science in the Public Interest.
  3. ↑ "Our Funding: CSPI Funding Sources". Center for Science in the Public Interest. Retrieved 2008-03-31.
  4. ↑ Masterson, K (October 14, 2007). "Food cop: Love him or hate him". Chicago Tribune.
  5. ↑ Kurtzweil, P. (July 1997). "Today's Special: Nutrition Information". FDA Consumer magazine (May–June 1997). Archived September 18, 2008, at the Wayback Machine.
  6. ↑ Amy Bentley. "Inventing Baby Food: Taste, Health, and the Industrialization of the American Diet". University of California Press, 2014, pg. 122.
  7. ↑ CSPI Accomplishments. "CSPI Accomplishments". Center for Science in the Public Interest. Retrieved 2007-10-02.
  8. ↑ Michael F Jacobson PhD, Liquid Candy: How Soft Drinks are Harming Americans' Health, (CSPI, Washington DC 1998; 2nd Ed. 2005).
  9. ↑ "Taxing Soda Could Trim State Deficits (and Waistlines), Says Report". April 1, 2010.
  10. ↑ "Color Wars re: Artificial Food Coloring CSPI releases report criticizing use of artificial colors in food.". The National Law Review (Keller and Heckman LLP). 21 January 2016. ISSN 2161-3362. Retrieved 22 January 2016.
  11. ↑ "Food Day". October 24, 2013.
  12. ↑ "Food Day Advisory Board". October 24, 2013.
  13. ↑ Nat Ives. "The media business: Advertising; a trade group tries to wean the alcohol industry from full-figured twins and other racy images". New York Times. March 6, 2003.
  14. ↑ "Alcohol industry ends its ad ban in broadcasting", New York Times. November 8, 1996.
  15. ↑ "Colleges are reaching their limit on alcohol". USAToday. November 16, 2006.
  16. ↑ "Bill would ask N.C.A.A. to forgo alcohol ads". New York Times. March 9, 2005.
  17. ↑ Sullum, Jacob (February 16, 2011) Loco over Four Loko, Reason
  18. ↑ http://www.cspinet.org/nutrition/schoolkit.html
  19. 1 2 3 David Schleifer (2012). "The Perfect Solution: How Trans Fats Became the Healthy Replacement for Saturated Fats". Columbia University. Retrieved September 10, 2012.
  20. ↑ Blume, Elaine (March 1988). "The truth about trans: hydrogenated oils aren't guilty as charged". Nutrition Action Healthletter, published by CSPI. Retrieved 16 March 2013.
  21. ↑ Severson, Kim (September 4, 2002). "McDonald's Oil Change". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved 2008-10-10.
  22. ↑ Liebman, Bonnie (October 1, 1990). "Trans in trouble". Nutrition Action Healthletter. Retrieved September 10, 2012.
  23. ↑ "Debate Flares on Fat From Hydrogenated Oils". New York Times. August 8, 1996. Retrieved 2008-10-08.
  24. ↑ "Trans fat is double trouble for your heart health". Mayo Foundation for Medical Education and Research (MFMER). Retrieved January 17, 2015.
  25. ↑ Mozaffarian D, Katan MB, Ascherio A, Stampfer MJ, Willett WC (April 13, 2006). "Trans Fatty Acids and Cardiovascular Disease". New England Journal of Medicine 354 (15): 1601–1613. doi:10.1056/NEJMra054035. PMID 16611951.
  26. ↑ Trans Fat Task Force (June 2006). "TRANSforming the Food Supply (Appendix 9iii)". Archived from the original on May 30, 2008. Retrieved 10-01-09. Check date values in: |access-date= (help)
  27. ↑ "The Bloomberg Diet: The nanny state reaches into the kitchen". Wall Street Journal. December 9, 2006. Retrieved 2008-10-10.
  28. 1 2 3 Warner, Melanie (June 12, 2005). "Striking Back at the Food Police". New York Times. Retrieved 2008-10-08.
  29. 1 2 Barr, Bob (September 17, 2006). "Scientific Research Ruse". Washington Times. Retrieved 2008-10-08.
  30. ↑ Olson, Walter (December 15, 2010) McDonald's suit over Happy Meal toys by California mom Monet Parham new low in responsible parenting, New York Daily News
  31. ↑ Ness, Carol (May 11, 2002). "Hand that feeds bites back: Food industry forks over ad campaign to win hearts, stomachs". San Francisco Chronicle. Retrieved 2008-10-14.
  32. ↑ Krieger, James; Saelens, Brian. "Impact of Menu Labeling on Consumer Behavior: A 2008-2012 Upadate". Healthy Eating Research. Retrieved 22 October 2014.

External links

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